The Recovering Dissident Catholic

A Former CINO (Catholic In Name Only) gradually learns and accepts the whole Magisterium Truth and Nothing but the Truth

June 29, 2010

The Case of the Missing Blog by Cathy of Alex

Or, The Day My Clock Was Cleaned

Gentle Reader: All 3 of my regular readers noticed that my blog was down for about 6 hours. It vanished. I was notified by Google that my account had “suspicious activity” and they shut it down! ‘bout time they noticed, now I am moving offshore…

Anyway

My first thought when I got up early this morning and noticed the blog was down was “Oh, well, thanks be to God!”

The blog is just “one more thing” for me to do and I’m feeling maybe it’s run its course. I’m having trouble finding time to blog.

I thought maybe it’s time to start that crazy freak blog that Vincenzo and I have talked about because, well, we are both crazy freaks! Or, maybe I could spend full-time (sure, ok) writing stories for “Our Word” because I already owe Mitchell SOME stories.

The Day Cathy of Alex was throwin’ something off the Marshall Street Bridge

Seriously, I want to throw my electronics in the dang river. I’m online all day at work and even ‘after’ work I’m still online for work. You can’t hide anywhere.

Speaking of hiding

I’m reading the news with concern these days. Ok, can we have an honest talk about Kagen’s sexuality please? Yeah, thank you. And, local wack job JA (the initials are not a coincidence, think about it-love Cranky!) crowing about now being able to sue the Vatican and get more money for himself. And church raids in Belgium. Honestly, how long is it going to be before we are truly kickin’ it old school and worshipping in the Wabasha Street Caves?

June 27, 2010

The Joy of St. John the Baptist

I read in my Magnificat this week a prayer that I be born in my life every day as someone who leaps with joy before the presence of the Lord.

I loved that. I wished I did.

A few days ago I had dinner with some friends-Catholic friends. Our conversation turned as it sometimes does to “gripes”; gripes about liturgy not properly executed, gripes about priests, gripes about this and that. Among our number is a recent convert. She said with an indulgent smile as she listened to us drone on and on, griping, that she was just glad to be Catholic!

How often do I reflect the joy of being a Catholic to others? Is Catholicism a continual bitch fest? If it is how, why or can anyone want to convert to The Faith? If I sit around griping and complaining about the Faith, what makes me any different from the dissenter I used to be? That’s what I did back then with my dissenting friends, sit around and gripe about how the Faith was not what we wanted it to be.

The Baptist was the herald of the Lord, the one who proclaimed him in such attractive words and actions that he brought many to Christ before they even knew Him. We should all strive to do the same. I should strive to do the same.

June 23, 2010

Keeping the Demons Away

A friend told me tonight he fears a demon is lurking in his house. I've had bizarre episodes in my home at times as well. However, they have largely abated.

My "secret" but it's not a secret: Hit 'em with prayer and blessed sacramentals! They HATE that. I've literally felt them leave as I prayed to St. Michael or started working my Rosary beads.

Even a family member, who is not practicing the Faith right now, has held at bay oppressive and evil spirits when she prayed "really hard".

It is at night that we feel most vulnerable. We are not fully alert. We are minimally dressed. We may not feel completely safe. I have an evening ritual (besides just my evening facial!). It's tried and tested by decades of Catholics before me.

I put a spot of Holy Water on my mattress where I sleep (a drop-not a flood!) and say "Lord, into they hands I commend my spirit" and then I pray the St. Michael prayer.

If something happens during the night I've already asked the Lord for mercy on my soul. I've already asked St. Michael for protection. It just occurred to me that my Angel is already there without asking but I should probably give him a call out too.

There are times that I don't follow this evening ritual; either because I forget or I'm too ashamed of myself to pray much less put blessed water on myself. This is a mistake and I realize that now. I need to ask for mercy at ALL times-not just when things are great and I'm 100% with the Lord. I need to use the sacramentals to avoid falling even deeper into The Pit. I tend to fall even further into serious sin if I don't keep to my before bed ritual.

Ritual-as Catholics that's something we should get behind. Duh! Do you see now another reason why ritual is SO important? I just did when I wrote this post!

June 21, 2010

Domine Non Sum Dignus...

Lord, I am not worthy….

I’ve been thinking this week that the holiest and best priests I know, when they are celebrating Mass, always have an air of “What the heck am I doing here?” As Moses said “Who am I Lord?” As St. Elizabeth said “Who am I that the Mother of my Lord should come to me?”

I can’t believe it. I can’t believe I answered the call of the Lord, much less that He called ME to begin with.

We should all approach the altar, in my humble opinion, with a mixture of awe, disbelief and unworthiness. Who am I Lord? Why would you even want ME around? There are only two people in the Church who are fully aware of my shortcomings and sins: me and God. Yet, I approach the altar and make myself vulnerable and humble to receive Him. It is not easy to be humble and vulnerable. Our entire society and self rebels against it. It’s at that moment that I know most keenly how unlike a “little one”, how un-childlike in my Faith I really am. I’m an adult with all the baggage that entails.

I have few moments when I feel as worthy as I’m ever likely to be and those are the few heedy moments after I emerge from the Confessional; even then I doubt the depth of my Contrition. I always doubt my seperation from sin as I still find some of my sins funny; so does Satan.

What can I do?

I only know I can’t walk away. I‘ve known people, and you probably have too, who are so ashamed and unworthy that they walk away. They come back to the Church for a funeral: theirs. It’s too late then. There have been many times I’ve walked away. True love and true marriage with Christ (probably the only marriage I’ll ever personally know) means: working at it. Don’t go to bed mad. Don’t go to bed not having spoken to the Lord in prayer that day. Don’t ignore the practice of the Faith. Keep at it.

We all know we are unworthy but we do the best we can. I know some of you hate that word “unworthy” and left the Church over it. Be honest with yourself. It’s true. I admit my unworthiness and you may say “that’s good for YOU”. It is good for me. It’s good for you too.

If we were all honest with ourselves we can openly admit that there are many time we are less than we should be. There are many times we are not there for anybody but ourselves. There are many time we are a bad friend. There are times we don’t love.What do you do then in those situations? Make it better? Make yourself better? Prove you are worthy? If you can do it for friends, family, co-workers, yourself-why not for Him too?

A holy Bishop that I know (though in his honest humility he would hate to hear himself called ‘holy’) refers to himself as “His unworthy servant”. He means it. I would disagree with his title for himself but he knows himself best. I, too, am His unworthy servant just as much as any ordained man.

Calvary’s onlookers were unworthy servants. The same audience is present today at Holy Mass.

However, the program has changed. The Lord died and rose for our sins. Let’s not die in ours.

June 16, 2010

Throwing Your Self Under the Bus

At work lately there has been a disturbing tendency to blame someone else when things don’t turn out right. We call it “throwing them under the bus”. The innocent are accused. Rather than “We are all in this together” its every person for themselves. Apparently, some people occasionally forget they need help doing the work. None of us can do everything alone. Yet, when the repercussions hit at the job we forget the team.

Isn’t it the same with sin? It’s someone elses fault that I was tempted and strayed. Like with any addiction, its helpful to avoid certain company on the road to recovery, but some of us can’t or won’t avoid situations or people when we get into trouble.

At work we can’t pick and choose who to work with once we are there. Sometimes it’s like that in life too. Aren’t there days you wish you could pick your own relatives?

I may have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ but I also have personal relationship with the people on the Earth; my co-workers, my neighbors, my friends, my family. We need to lift each other up. We need to collaborate. We need to help each other get to Heaven.

No matter what environment we are in or who we are with we need to be our best and most Catholic self. We need to model Christian behavior.

Are you ever a certain person with one set of friends and someone else at work? Are you different with your family? Do people even know you are Christian?

I admit I’m not always on my best behavior. I’m not consistent. It’s a sign of God’s Divine Mercy that I’m not solely responsible for evangelizing the world or else we’d be in big trouble.

Rather than worrying about throwing blame at someone else. I need to throw my self under the bus. I need to get rid of my less charitable tendancies and model better behavior.

June 12, 2010

Balance Between Faith and Insanity

What is it? Seriously.

Many of you, ok the 5 of you, who've been my regular readers know that last year was not the best year of my life. I was unemployed (willfully because I walked out of my job due to my boss being a psycho) or underemployed for most of it.

I prayed to the Lord and I trusted in Him and He provided. I kept the roof over my head. I was able to eat-yeah, so much so that I've gained more weight! I survived.

Thanks Be to God.

I got a new job after Thanksgiving last year. The salary is great. I like who I work with and what I do.

But, the hours are insane. I was so busy last week that I did not get to check my personal email for 5 days. I'm going to have to work some of this weekend.

My daily prayer continues and I admit it's probably not my most focused effort; but, I'm trying to keep the dialogue with the Lord going.

Many of you know of my deep devotion to the Sacred Heart. Well, I pretend it's deep, as to my sorrow I was unable to finish work early enough yesterday to get to Mass. I got to read the Introit to the EF Mass of the Sacred Heart rather than "live it" in Mass. There's a difference between reading it and doing it.

I need to do stuff around the house and yard. My yard is a disaster.

Too much going on. Forget Facebook and Twitter and all that extra social media.Why be social with media? Heck, I can barely be social with my friends and family!

Some days I feel like I'm losing my mind. I end up picking and choosing what I can deal with today. I need more time with the Lord. I don't have time to blog.

So, if I'm scarce these days, I'm in an Adoration Chapel praying for strength, praying in gratitude for what I DO have.

June 06, 2010

Why Being a Catholic Means Always Having to Say More Than: Sorry

Some of you may have seen the cover of the June 7, 2010 issue of Time, or as Father GW calls it Slime.

It's preposterous. Most of the media coverage of Catholicism is preposterous. But, people buy this anti-Catholicism and distortions of the Faith, if they didn't the publishers would stop printing it. Never let facts get in the way of making money and selling copy.

I find it curious that so many who try and minimize the Holy Father's role as spiritual leader of Roman Catholicism, suddenly want him to take on the sins of others. I have news for you, the Holy Father is not Christ. His Holiness has never claimed be to Christ; none of the Popes of all the ages of the Church have ever done that.

In fact, truly holy men would flinch whenever they are called "His Holiness". It doesn't mean that we quit referring to them as such; in their office they are, it's just the man himself is probably thinking: "Oh, if you only knew how far from holy I really am"

I can't speak for the man, Joseph Ratzinger's, state of personal holiness, anymore than I can make a Confession on his behalf. Similarly, the Holy Father can't receive Absolution in the Confessional for the sins of his brother priests or his flock.

But, as members of the same Body of Christ when one of our members is sick we want to help them. We pray for them, we apologize for them, we make reparation for them as much as we can, we nurse them. That is what the Holy Father is doing and those are actions that those who have no clue about Catholicism can't get their heads around. They want the Holy Father to "step down", they want him to pay out a bunch of money. He's not the CEO of BP or Toyota and by the way do those CEO's always step down and pay out a lot of money? When or if they do does that make it all better? No.

The Holy Father as a Catholic, regardless of his office, is doing the best he can with what he knows. We should all do the same.

As the Year of Priests closes, I'm reflecting upon how thankful I am to God that it's not ME "up there" on the Altar offering The Sacrifice; it's not me "in there" in the Confessional guiding people back to the Lord.

This past week as I was so mired in mortal sin, prior to my Confession and Absolution on First Friday, I was so ashamed of my sins I could not even talk to God. My prayer life dried up for a week. Can you imagine being a PRIEST and feeling that way? Yet, I'm sure many do. Unfortunately for them, but fortunately for us, they can't take a vacation and leave town while they "get it together", they can't call in "sick" and expect someone to fill in for them at a moments notice.

Saying "sorry" seems so inadequate. That's why we have Confession, Absolution, Atonement, Reparation: big words with big meaning. Don't worry, people of faith and more credentials have spent centuries trying to define them. We can't expect those who do not share our faith to grasp what I mean when I say "sorry" is not enough and that's not the entiriety of what the Holy Father is doing. Sorry is too limiting. It's a start but it's an almost infantile one. Is that why the Holy Father is perceived by some as falling down in "his job" because he has not said "sorry"? Some want us to believe sorry is enough. We know there is more to it than that.

June 02, 2010

Dark Night of the Blog

I have nothing to blog about these days and am not feeling inspired so here it is-lame.

I will mention, because I know you live only to read about my wasted life (ok, that was hostile, sorry), that I'm mired in serious sin right now and can't get to a Confessional fast enough. True to myself, I sinned big time over the weekend-that old vacation from Christ package deal!

I wish I could be as true to the Lord as I am consistent in sin. I shouldn't wish it; I should pray on it and live it.

In other news, I'm starting a Paypal account to take contributions for Nazareth Priest while he's here this weekend because apparently a big hug and a smile are not enough. A minimum stipend is in his publicity materials; but he wants us to know he is avaiable for conferences and retreats!

Meow, kidding! LOL! Nazareth Priest is cool and I'm ribbing another priest who will now probably ban me from his chat room! I'm wondering at what point I became Terry? Hey, it's Wacky Wednesday!

What other inane babble can I come up with?

Oh, June is the month of the Sacred Heart which is a point of Catholic pride but not Pride, you dig?

June 01, 2010

Deep Thoughts (Random Insanity) with Cathy!

1) If Obama is the Second Coming, as some of his supporters during the last election would have us believe, why is he unable to stand in the Gulf and stop the oil spill with his bare hands? While he's at it, he can hold the oil-infested waters back with his mighty hand!

2) So, deep sea oil drilling has a moratorium (of a sort) after a big disaster but after an airplane crash or train derailment, planes and trains keep running? After 9/11 were we all told to stay out of tall buildings? (Believe me, I wanted to!)

3) Which would you prefer: a) The Mass of the ages, tried, tested and refined by experts or b) The Mass of the minute, composed, designed and made-up by liturgy coordinators

4) Is Nancy Pelosi's catechism instructor dead? Seriously, who was he/she/it and WT-?

When I posted this, Terry hugged a teddy bear and Ray vowed he'd never be hungry again.